Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or impact of the engagement?
All I can provide is subjective feedback for now. It will be difficult for us to disentangle what was gained from Multidots Solutions’ work since we have taken on a different type of web advertising campaign that’s concurrent with the launch of the new website. I think that they’re both playing a role. Because of the way in which we implemented lead generation, compared to the old website, we have fewer leads, but they’re all higher-quality. On the old website, anyone who registered was a lead, but they didn’t necessarily fill-out project request forms. On the new website, we have a soft registration at the beginning of the project request and a hard registration at the end, even though it’s not made evident to users that it’s a registration process. They’re providing piecemeal information, and we’ve found that the people who are willing to go through that whole form are also more willing to talk to us on the phone.
There has been a little bit of trepidation in our company. The changes we’ve made have reversed some conscious decisions we’d made at the management level, relating to how we presented the product. Some of our designers and members of the sales department have pushed back, but Multidots Solutions has been great with retrofitting some of the old information into the new site in a way which looks seamless and intentional. Overall, the results have been positive.
How did Multidots Solutions perform from a project management standpoint?
The project itself ran a bit over budget, mostly due to midstream changes put in place by us. Multidots Solutions gave us honest estimates on any additional work, and they’ve mostly come under those estimates.
We communicated mostly over Skype, which allowed our side to be mobile, while also keeping costs down. We could have screen-sharing as well as face-to-face meetings, which is very nice in cases where we aren’t meeting the development team but still want to have a connection. Our development team lead got married during the project, and he sent us photos from the wedding. They’re all a bunch of good people.
What did you find most impressive about Multidots Solutions?
A far as India-based resources go, communication is everything. Multidots Solutions seems to have an almost native-speaker grasp of the English language, which is very helpful since that’s the only language I speak. At the same time, if they don’t understand something, they’re not afraid to ask. There have only been two or three issues in the entire development of the site that I could positively attribute to miscommunication. When we explained things again to Multidots Solutions, they understood us. During my past experiences with developers, I have had trepidation around the communication. From a business standpoint, we never want to say that we’re not communicating properly, as far as resources are concerned. Multidots Solutions is aware that there will always be technical difficulties with the communication tools and that language barriers will always be present when using an outsourced resource. They really try to make these drawbacks as painless as possible. Even with the technical team leads, it was as if we were dealing with people who had been speaking English their whole lives. That shows me that Multidots Solutions is hiring people for an international audience, versus choosing the less-expensive resources who may not have those skills.
Even when it came to competing with domestic companies, Multidots Solutions went out and did the legwork before we talked to them. In my book, that’s huge. Everyone involved in our decision-making put Multidots Solutions in high esteem before we even paid them a cent. When we performed the business analysis portion of the work, no other company offered something similar as a standalone optional fee. It was either required, with a cost of $20,000 or $30,000, or not mentioned at all. Multidots Solutions’ offer was for around $1,000. They found out everything that could be found out about our business and performed market research.
Are there any areas Multidots Solutions could improve?
It would be tough to say because when we’re developing a solution, we have an idea of what it should be. No matter if it’s written down or simply explained, it’s often our own fault that it doesn’t get done as it should. There were two or three occasions when something wasn’t communicated properly. Could Multidots Solutions have done better? Probably, but things like this are bound to happen. They’re not avoidable situations, and I think that if someone did figure out how to avoid these things, they’d be the only one. It’s an iterative, creative process.
On another note, we don’t keep many holidays in America, but they have them all the time in India. It’s actually tempting to go work there.
What tips or recommendations could you share that might increase the likelihood of success with Multidots Solutions?
We had a very good outline for an idea of how to develop our graphical assets, and we thought that our internal team could cover all of this. It turned out to be our biggest bottleneck, though. We had some pressure to start the production of the website sooner than we were ready to. If the client is looking to start a similar project, they should make sure that all graphical and copy assets are in-line.
Each project has improved the main site's UX, which has helped inspire confidence in Multidots' expertise. The team is cognizant of project timelines, working to ensure that everything launches without a hitch.